Kimble [Kimball] Bent An Unusual European Who Deserted The British Army And Joined The Hau Hau #10

len.george (63)in #history • 5 years ago

About this time “Ringiringi” changed hands, much as if he were a fat porker or a keg of powder or any other article of Maori barter.

Rupe (“Wood-pigeon”), a chief of Taiporohenui, made a request of Tito, to whom he was related, for his pakeha mokai, his tame white man.

He had never owned a pakeha,[european] he explained and would like one all to himself, and he knew that “Ringiringi” would be a handy man to have around, to keep his armoury of guns, of miscellaneous makes and dates, in repair, and to make cartridges for him.

So “Ringiringi” was passed over to his new owner, whom he served, with the exception of some short intervals in the war-time and in the period of exile on the Upper Waitara, until 1878.

Soon after “Ringiringi” had become one of Rupe's household, his chief's son, a young lad named Kuku (another name for the wood-pigeon), fell seriously ill.

The white man doctored and carefully nursed the boy, and under his treatment, he recovered. Rupe's gratitude to his mokai took a chieftain-like form.

As payment or utu, for curing his son, he led up his daughter, a young girl of fifteen or sixteen, and presented her to “Ringiringi” as his wife.

“Indeed, she was a pretty girl,” says the old pakeha-Maori, recalling the dead past.

“I'll never forget her.

She had handsome features, almost European, though she was of pure Maori blood.

Her lips were small, her hair was wavy and curly, instead of hanging in a straight, black mat, and she had what was very strange in a Maori, blue eyes, the first blue-eyed native he had ever seen.

She was a very gentle girl, she never kanga'd [cursed] or said unpleasant things about others, never quarrelled with the other women.

She did not smoke either, which was unusual.

Her chin was tattooed, but not too thickly or deeply.

She had, too, the rapé\e and tiki-hope patterns engraved on her body, the hip, and thigh, tattooing which was in fashion in those days, and which the girls and women were proud of displaying when they went out to bathe.

With this agreeable young wife, whose name was Rihi, or Te Hau-roroi-ua, Bent lived for nearly three years.

She bore one child, which died, and soon after she, too, died, to the pakeha-Maori's great sorrow.

His one-eyed wife, the lady of Otapawa, had left her unwilling husband some months before he took Rihi in Maori marriage.

Amongst the primitive arts of the Maori with which “Ringiringi” became familiar about this time was that of moko or tattooing.

The kauae tattooing, on chin and lips, was still universal amongst the native women, though few of the men now submitted their faces to the chisel or the needle of the tattooing artist.

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A popular form of tattooing amongst both sexes was that technically known as tiki-hope, the scroll-patterns on the thighs and other parts of the body usually concealed by the waist-shawl.

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The white man saw numbers of women as well as men decorated in this fantastic fashion.

In fact, he was so thoroughly Maori by this time that he was about to undergo the operation himself, in the winter of 1867, when living at the village Te Paka, near the old fort Otapawa.

He had the ngarahu, or kapara, the blue-black pigment, ready for the dusky engraver, and would shortly have been made pretty for life in Maori eyes had not the tattooing been peremptorily forbidden.

“I wanted my face tattooed,” says Bent, “for I was as wild as any Maori then.

I intended to have the curves called tiwhana, or arches, tattooed on my forehead, over the eyes, and the kawekawe lines on the cheeks, extending to the corners of the mouth.

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What a curiosity I would have been, though, when I came out of the bush I would have been able to earn my living in my old age, going on exhibition, like the bearded lady in the circus

It was Te Ua the prophet who forbade the tattooing.

He happened to be in residence at Te Paka just then, and he reminded “Ringiringi” that he had tapu'd him and explained that to moko [tattoo] his skin would be a violation of that particular brand of tapu.

To the white man, this was not quite clear, nevertheless, he agreed to obey the prophet's Mosaic command “to make no cuttings” in his flesh, and remained a plain, undecorated pakeha.

However, he acquired some skill himself with the tattooing instruments and exercised it in printing names and sundry devices on the persons of the villagers.

He learned, too, how to manufacture the indelible ngarahu, or kapara, pigment.

In making this tattooing-ink the soot from fires of white-pine (kahikatea) wood was used.

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A cave-like hole was dug in the side of a bank, with an opening resembling a chimney in the top.

A large fire was kindled in the cave or rua, and for several days was constantly fed with the resinous timber of the kahikatea.

Above the earth-chimney were arranged a number of twigs of the karamu shrub (a coprosma), with the bark stripped off, set up in the shape of a tent, and covered with a layer of leaves.

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The dense smoke from the fire deposited a thick soot on the karamu sticks.

For some days the fire was kept up, then the twigs were removed, and the soot scraped off into wooden receptacles.
It was mixed with water and worked into little round balls.

These soot balls were then placed on a layer of poroporo leaves

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in an umu, or earth-oven, and steamed for about three hours, when they were taken out and set to dry.

In later times, after the war, Bent often employed himself in the manufacture of this tattoo dye; and was, he says, accustomed to receiving ten shillings for a ball of ngarahu the size of a peach.

Info From

The first of the below posts has a list of the previous posts of Maori Myths and Legends

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/how-war-was-declared-between-tainui-and-arawa

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-curse-of-manaia-part-1

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-curse-of-manaia-part-2

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-legend-of-hatupatu-and-his-brothers

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/hatupatu-and-his-brothers-part-2

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-legend-of-the-emigration-of-turi-an-ancestor-of-wanganui

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-continuing-legend-of-turi

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/turi-seeks-patea

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-legend-of-manaia-and-why-he-emigrated-to-new-zealand

https://steemit.com/history/@len.george/the-love-story-of-hine-moa-the-maiden-of-rotorua